


Healing the Dreamer

by dark_pookha



Series: Luna Crosses Over [3]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling, Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Cabeswater - Freeform, Community: HPFT, Crossover, Dreaming, M/M, Strong Language, pynch - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-08
Updated: 2018-06-08
Packaged: 2019-05-19 20:50:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,421
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14880974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dark_pookha/pseuds/dark_pookha
Summary: Luna Lovegood travels to Henrietta to help heal Ronan Lynch and stop the nightmares that are manifesting in parallel worlds.





	Healing the Dreamer

  
Luna folded the Daily Planet up and slid it under her bowl of half-eaten plain oatmeal with grapefruit supremes. Anyone who found it in this reality would assume it was a joke newspaper.

A shave-headed young man came into the diner, ordered a coffee, and looked at her sidelong, like he was assessing her threat level. She smiled at him and waved her hand, keeping her wand concealed up her sleeve. It left a trail of blue vapor behind it. His face hardened, but after he got his coffee from the counterperson, he came over to her table.

“Who the hell are you and what do you want?”

“I’m Luna Scamander and you are having problems with your dreams, Mr. Lynch. May I call you Ronan?” she said in a lilting English accent.

“No. I don’t know you or what you want to buy, but I’m not selling, got it?” He snarled like a wolverine who had just found its sett invaded by a grizzly bear.

“Oh, please sit down, I promise I’m not here to cause trouble.” She smiled and gestured at the chair. It slid back from the table. Ronan watched the wand with even narrower eyes.

He slammed his coffee down on the table causing it slosh over his hand.

“Fuck!” The dry, raw skin on the back of his hand reddened immediately. He reached over and took an ice cube out of Luna’s ice water with his dirty fingers. He sat down and sighed as he rubbed the ice on his hand.

“Seriously, what do you want?” he growled. “I don’t have time for the normal mind-fuckery from you people.”

“What ‘people’ do you believe me to be?” Luna asked mildly.

He looked her over carefully for the first time. Short, probably just barely taller than Sargent. Her dirty blonde hair reminded him more of Opal than of his mother, and he figured she was just old enough to be his mother. She was slight, but there was a hardness reflected in the silvery-blue of her eyes that told him that she had seen things. What sort of things, he didn’t know, but things nonetheless.

“I think you’re one of the people who’ve been coming here to try to buy my shit.” He dropped the now-small sliver of ice on the table and plucked another from her glass. He began to rub it on his hand.

“You all should know by now to contact Mr. Gray first and he’ll tell you I’m not selling, and also to stay the fuck out of Henrietta.”

“Oh, I’m not here to buy or sell anything, particularly not your ‘shit.’ I’m here to help you fix your dreams and also to help repair the leyline here.” She met his eyes, unafraid. “I know you’re having nightmares.” She waved her hands vaguely. “Manifesting them in Henrietta and I’m here to get you to stop.”

“I can’t stop dreaming, and wouldn’t want to if I could.” He stood to leave, letting the ice fall to the table.

“Oh, I don’t want you to stop dreaming, I just want you to dream the right things. What you’re doing now is making the leyline and yourself sick and the land along with it, Fisher-King style.”

He eyed her again and took a drink of his coffee before sitting down.

“You mean that crap about the health of the land being tied to the health of the king?” he asked.

She nodded.

“It’s just bullshit,” he said, but he didn’t look convinced.

“How do I know I can trust you?” Ronan asked. He picked out another piece of ice and rubbed it on his hand as he talked. “I mean, I do think things have gone even more to shit lately, but I’m not going to just do what some random English lady says.” He met her eyes and she saw a hardness that belied his age.

“I’m willing to prove myself to you,” Luna said. “I’ll do what it takes.”

He closed his eyes and thought. She noticed the dark circles even more with his eyes closed. “I might know some people who could tell if you’re on the up and up.” He opened his eyes. “Would you be willing to have a psychic reading?”

She extended her hand across the table. Ronan looked at it like it was a live snake. He made no move to touch it.

“Not me, dipshit,” he said semi-scathingly. “Some women I know, one of them is the mother of a…” he paused, “…friend of mine.”

“Absolutely,” she said and stood. “Do we Apparate there?”

“If by ‘Apparate,’ you mean teleport, then no. We don’t do that shit here.” He laughed a real hearty laugh. “Although, if I could teleport, I wouldn’t be going there.”

“Where would you go?” Luna asked curiously.

Ronan shook his head and stood. He pulled his keys out of his pocket, flipped them in the air, caught them just as they were about to hit the table and pushed a button on his fob. A bleep-boop came from outside and Luna saw his sleek grey sports car. He downed the rest of his coffee in long swig that worked his throat. Luna saw scratches on his neck just under his collar.

“Not worried that I’m going to abduct you?” he asked as they walked to his car.

She shook her head. “No, I could handle you if I have to, but you wouldn’t like it.” She eyed him sidelong and smiled. “Or maybe you would, I don’t know.”

“Are you flirting with me?” he asked. “It’s kind of creepy.”

She laughed as she tried to figure out the door handle on his car. “No, definitely not. I’m married.”

He showed her how to open the door. She looked at the handle and worked it back and forth a couple of times.

“Married doesn’t mean you can’t flirt; it just means you shouldn’t do anything about it,” Ronan said.

“Hmm,” Luna said as she got into the car and sat down. Ronan went around to the other side and got in. He showed Luna how to fasten the racing harness that his car had in lieu of seatbelts.

“I also wouldn’t flirt with you, because you’re so much younger than I am…”

“You don’t swing the younger man vibe, then,” Ronan said, cutting her off.

“…and also because I think you prefer men,” Luna finished.

Ronan paused, key half-way to the ignition. “How the fuck would you know that?”

“I don’t _know_ , but it’s a strong guess, I think.” Luna smiled, pulled out her Spectrespecs and put them on. “I can just tell things about people sometimes; not like I’m psychic, but more that I can read body language or speech or something. I don’t always understand it myself.”

Ronan started the car and they drove to Fox Way in silence. Luna looked at the window at the blue and pink tinted scenery.

They got out after Luna had a brief struggle with the harness and went to the door. She started to knock, but Ronan just ripped it open and stepped into the house. As he walked in, Luna followed him. He stomped through it to the reading room, where he bellowed, “Sargent!”

“Hush, Snake!” a woman’s voice shouted from down a hallway and possibly up some steps. “Maura’s out with Mr. Gray!” The voice got closer as she spoke. “What do you want?”

She appeared in the doorway, the first thing Luna noticed was her plum lipstick and the second was her size. She wasn’t a large woman, but she took up all the space around her with presence. Luna could feel the power coming off her from where she stood. The second thing she noticed was the huge purse the woman carried. It had a yoga mat sticking out of it and looked heavy, packed for a day out. On a second look, the woman looked made up for a night out.

“We’re here for a reading,” Luna said, extending her hand. The lady did not take it.

“Sorry, I’m psychometric and I don’t shake hands unless I already know you,” the woman said. “Follow me.”

She led the way to a sitting room and sat down in a comfortable, but worn armchair. She scooted it closer to the table and indicated for Ronan and Luna to sit. They both sat down across from her at the table.

“I’m Luna Scamander and I’m here to help Mr. Lynch with his dreams…” Luna started.

“Fuck, boy, are you having nightmares again?” the woman asked. Before Ronan could say anything she said, “I’m Calla Johnson. Why do you need a reading?”

“He doesn’t know if he could trust me or not and thought a reading could help,” Luna said.

Calla reached down, dug deeply in her purse and produced a package of tarot cards. She gave them to Luna and instructed her to shuffle them and then cut them. Luna shuffled them by mixing them in a messy pile on the table and then squaring up the edges. Ronan and Calla both looked on with slight smiles. Luna then pulled her wand from her sleeve, touched the deck and cut it where it had slid away from her wand.

Calla took the deck and held it for a moment, looking Luna in the eyes the whole time. Then she reached across and grabbed Luna’s hand tightly. Luna felt she could pull away if her life depended on it, but not for anything less; Calla’s grip was tight.

“Where are you from, girl?” Calla asked. “I don’t think you’re from this world.” She pulled her hand back.

“I’m from an alternate reality, and the trouble that Mr. Lynch is having here is spilling into other realities and causing power surges on their leylines. I’m here to help him fix this.” Luna kept her wand in her hand, but loosely.

“The fuck you say,” Ronan said, “like a parallel Earth or some shit like that?”

“Exactly like that, Mr. Lynch,” Luna said.

Calla shook her head and dealt out a spread.

Luna pointed at a card with the moon on it. “Is this me?” she asked.

Calla shook her head. “No, that’s him.” She looked troubled. “In this case, with this layout, it means that he’s not sure about something or there’s something he thinks he should do, but hasn’t because he hasn’t reconciled his thinking mind with his unthinking mind.”

She turned to Ronan. “Boy, whatever’s got you in a tizzy, you need to figure out quick and resolve it, or your nightmares will eat you up.” She poked a finger at him. “And I think in this case, I mean literally eat you up.”

Calla pointed at another card on the table, the Queen of Cups. “That’s you, Luna. In this case, a woman who has come to grips with her power by melding her thinking and unthinking. You used to operate more on instinct, but as the years went by, you started to think through your actions more and now you live in balance.”

A dark-haired woman with frizzy hair with things stuck in it peeked around the doorframe. “The Moon, La Lune, a spoon, hem hoon…” she trailed off.

She came around the door and Luna saw her fully. None of her clothes matched and she was dressed in layers that didn’t always sync up. Her hair had pencils and ladles and crayons, and what Luna would later swear was a wizard’s wand in it. She eyed the tableau of cards on the table, looked at Ronan, then at Luna, then back at Ronan.

She spoke in rapid fire Welsh and Luna replied haltingly in the same language. She sang a snippet of a song and Luna asked a question. The woman shook her head, pointed at Ronan, stuck out her tongue, and then pirouetted on a heel and left the room.

When she had left, Luna asked Ronan, “is she really Gwenllian verch Glendower? I’d like to hear that story sometime, but now isn’t the time.”

“What did that crazy thing tell you?” Ronan asked, meaning Gwenllian.

“She said that she was a small brass mirror, your friend Blue was a large glass mirror and I’m a lantern with a small parabolic mirror; both a fire and mirror at once and the sum brighter than their parts. She also said you were a ‘fucking bonfire’ and that if I wasn’t careful, I would melt in the heat before I could reflect any light.” Luna smiled. “She asked me if wanted to help you, sang a small bit of a ballad about an out of control summer fire on a mountain then left.”

She turned her attention back to Calla and Ronan.

Calla touched each of the cards on the table, then held out a hand for Ronan. He paused before taking it. She held out her other hand for Luna and Luna grasped it, then Ronan and Luna clasped hands. Calla closed her eyes and put her head back. It was only a moment, but all three of them could feel the power that surged through the room, emanating in an electric spill from Ronan and passing through the temperance of Luna to Calla and back from Calla in a clear pattern to Luna and then to Ronan.

Calla let go of both of their hands and then Ronan dropped Luna’s.

“Yes, you can trust her,” Calla said. She smiled, and a hint of her purple lipstick glinted on one of her teeth. “But you knew that already, didn’t you?”

Ronan nodded. “I think I knew almost at once, but I had to be sure.” He turned to Luna. “It would have been too bad if Mr. Gray had to kill you like he did my father.”

Luna blinked at him. “What?” she asked, confused.

Ronan laughed sharply. “Not important now.”

Calla stood. “Now get out, I have to get to yoga, and I’m late already.” She shooed them out of the house and locked it up.

When they left, Luna paused, sensing something. She went around the house to the backyard. She scrambled over the fence and went up to the large beech tree that spread its branches thickly over the yard. Ronan stayed away. He didn’t like the tree anymore. It used to remind him of Cabeswater, but now it just reminded him of Sargent’s cowardly father. Luna put her hand on the tree and spoke to it. Ronan could just hear her soft voice, but she was speaking Welsh and he didn’t understand it.

After five minutes or so, Luna came back to Ronan with tears in her eyes. He looked at her in shock; he thought she was stronger than that.

“Don’t worry about him, he’s a loser,” Ronan jerked his thumb at the tree.

“He’s in so much pain; out of his time, out of his land, lost his king, almost lost himself.” She wiped away a tear. “I promised him that if I found a world with tir e elintes in it that I would let him know and take him there. He said that Blue would understand.” Luna looked at Ronan frankly. “You need to tell me everything that happened here. I know a lot of energy was drawn from this leyline over the last two years and that you dreaming things into reality was part of it, but if you drew that much energy yourself, you’d be just a burnt shell.”

Ronan motioned for her to follow and they went through the gate this time to the front of the house and his car. As they drove to Monmouth Manufacturing, he filled her in on the events of the last few years. She seemed especially interested in Gansey, Kavinsky and Adam and probed him deeper for information on all of them.

As they sat in Monmouth later, she drew the conversation back to Adam. “Did he ever thank you for anything you did for him?” she asked.

“Not usually in so many words,” he said as Chainsaw, his pet raven, noisily devoured a cold hot dog. “He would sometimes be prickly about it. He wants to do so much on his own. He has a hard time telling the difference between a helping hand and pity being forced on him.”

“Why did you bring me here, instead of your home?” Luna asked.

“I was making sure all my shit was out of here earlier and needed to stop to get the last of it.” He pointed at Chainsaw. “Besides, I left her here while I made my coffee run so she could fly around and poke into the junk here. I had to come get her. ”

“Take me to your home, I think I need to see it.”

Ronan gathered up a small pack of his belongings, then they left for The Barns, Luna looked out the window most of the way and seemed fascinated by the land.

When they reached The Barns, Luna twirled in the driveway outside the house. She could feel the pricklings of the leyline, the dream energy that filled the place. She wished she could harness its power; what good she could do, then she caught herself in fantasies of fixing the world and knew she would be a tyrant, a loving tyrant, but still a tyrant.

“I can feel it,” she told Ronan. “I can feel the power here. It’s both used and potential; dream and real.”

“You can feel the leyline?” he asked. “Is that normal for a wizard where you come from? Or a witch?”

“No.” Luna shook her head, coming out of her ecstasy. “Most wizards or witches don’t think they’re real, and in my world they’re weak, because we had something happen to the Old Ways that had crossed Britain and, I think, the entire world. But it’s not just the leyline I feel here, it’s also something else, probably your dream energy.”

The front door of the house banged open and Opal came rushing out as fast as she could in her rubber boots. She ran up right up to Luna and sniffed her eagerly.

“That’s strange,” Ronan said, “she usually doesn’t like strangers and hides from them.”

“I can feel the dreamstuff in her too, though it’s barely there,” Opal said.

Luna knelt by the feral girl and tousled her dirty hair that leaked from under her cap. Opal preened. Luna turned back to Ronan.

“This is your psychopomp?” she asked. Ronan nodded.

“This is part of the problem,” Luna said. “She needs to go back into your dreams; she doesn’t belong in the real world.” She turned back to Opal. “Do you want to go back into his dreams?”

Opal shook her head, then nodded, then shook her head again. “I don’t know…” she whined, trailing off at the end. She sniffled and began to cry slowly. “It’s so cool out here, but it’s also scary. I want to be able to do both.”

Luna stood and asked to be taken to the long barn. Ronan led the way with Opal gamboling around them in circles. He opened the barn door and Luna gasped, her face rapturous.

“It’s beautiful; you’re beautiful,” she said.

“Now I know you’re flirting with me, you creepy old hag,” Ronan said, smiling.

Luna punched him lightly in the arm and he flashed back to Adam and Ronan.

She moved through the barn with Opal at her side the entire time. Ronan went to a plastic bin and opened it. He spoke a few words and rain began to emerge from it, slowly at first, then filling the entire barn. Luna examined the trees and green hillocks. Opal lifted her face and caught raindrops as it began to rain harder. Luna waved her wand and said something. Most of the rain avoided her, misting her only lightly.

She completed her tour of the barn in just a few minutes and returned to where Ronan stood by the plastic bin full of cloudy rain that had expanded out.

“It’s good. I see now what your problem is here,” Luna said.

“The fuck is my problem?” Ronan asked.

Luna shook her head sadly. “You’re trying to be too perfect. Just let it be you; it is you; it’s all you. You’re not perfect; your new Cabeswater will never be perfect either. Make it the best of you, but don’t try to hide away your darker side, either. It’s important to all of this.” She spun around and Opal spun with her. “When you’re trying to stop your dark side from going into this, it’s leaking out into nightmares that manifest separately.”

She shook her head. “Don’t try to make it all lightness, mix it with the dark or the dark will come out anyway, but in big gobs at once, and they’ll suck more energy from the leyline than you meant to.”

“You sound like Adam,” Ronan said, sitting on the wet ground and lowering his head. Opal moved to him and began to nibble on his stubble. He started to shoo her off, then grabbed her in a hug.

“Adam sounds wise from everything you’ve told me,” Luna said.

“He’s smart, is that the same as wise?” Ronan asked.

“No,” Luna replied. “You can be smart, but not wise and vice versa. I would say that Adam sounds like a good balance, or at least he’s working toward a good balance, but you’re not being wise.”

“And how should I be wise?” Ronan asked.

“You need Adam here with you to balance you,” Luna said. “You need to collaborate with him.” She met his gaze frankly. “You need to tell him that you love him.”

“It took me a long time to admit it,” Ronan said in a tiny voice, unlike himself.

“Have you ever told him that you love him?” she asked.

He shook his head. “Not in words.”

“Gestures are good, but you need to say it in words; words have a power that gestures don’t. You need to let him know how you feel.”

“Even if I do, it won’t do any good. He has to be where he is now, away at college. He needs to do this for him.” A tear rolled down Ronan’s cheek, melding with the rain.

“Just because he’s away doesn’t mean you can’t collaborate. You can call him on your…telephone?” she said unsurely.

“Cell phone, and Adam doesn’t have one.” Ronan shook his head again.

“Okay.” Luna knelt by him. “Dream something that you can use to keep in touch with him. Dream something that allows you two to share energy even though he’s not here. Tell him you love him and you need to be able to be with him, even if it’s by proxy.” Luna hugged Ronan, who didn’t reciprocate.

“Go to him, drive to his University and speak to him in person. Bring him dreamstuff and take energy back from him. You’ll both be better for it and your work here will also help to heal the leyline. You’ll draw energy for it, but you’ll also be putting life back into it.”

She paused. “And love, too; you’ll be putting love back into it.”

Opal shouted in both of their ears. “And me, too! I’ll be going back into the new Cabeswater!”

**Epilogue**

Ronan pulled over on the side of the interstate.

“You sure you want to get out here; there’s nothing around for miles and it’s dark?”

Luna smiled. “No, it has to be here. I don’t know why, but I have a feeling about it and I trust my instincts.”

She unhooked the harness and got out.

“Tell him you love him.”

Ronan nodded. Luna closed the door and the car tore off in a spray of gravel.

Luna had walked about a hundred meters when an older-model, slick black car sped by her. Its brake lights flashed as it fish-tailed to a stop, then reversed up to her. A window rolled down, and the younger, shaggier-haired of the two men it in it leaned out.

“Do you need a ride, lady?” He asked. “You shouldn’t be walking alone, there are cougars reported around here.”

The driver leaned over. “I see one right there.”

“Hello, Sam, Dean,” Luna said. “You’re on the way to Washington?”

The driver went wary immediately. “Who are you?” His hand crept toward a jacket pocket.

“I’m Luna Lovegood and we’re going to Washington to deal with a monster in the Smithsonian.” She smiled. “A demon, I believe?”

“…and what are you?” the passenger asked.

“I’m a witch,” Luna said, pulling out her wand from her sleeve. “You’re going to need me.”

**Double Epilogue**

Adam returned to his dorm room late, around midnight after working at the dining hall, then studying in the library until it closed. He fumbled in his pockets for his keys when he saw Ronan sitting in front of the door, his head slumped as he slept. He put his hand on Ronan’s shoulder and Ronan jerked awake immediately.

“What’s wrong?” Adam asked.

“Nothing,” Ronan said, “and everything.”

He stood and put his hands on Adam’s shoulder. He looked him in his eyes.

“I love you, Adam,” he said and pulled Adam in for a brief kiss.

Adam pulled back and Ronan repeated, “I love you.”

Adam’s fair skin flushed immediately. “I love you, too,” he said for the first time to Ronan.

“Can we talk inside or is your roommate in?” Ronan asked.

Adam shook his head. “He’s away for the weekend visiting his girlfriend back home.” He put his key in the lock and turned it.

They both went in and Adam locked the door behind him. When he turned back, Ronan was there holding a cellphone.

“This is so we can keep in touch,” Ronan said.

Adam shook his head. “I can’t afford it and I don’t want you to pay for it.”

Ronan sighed. “It’s a dream object, neither of us has to pay for it. I just need you to call at least once a week, so we can collaborate and share energy. This will help with that.”

Adam took the phone and looked at it closely. Nothing about it said dream object, but he could feel it pulsing in his hand with the life from the leyline, the new Cabeswater, and most importantly from Ronan.

“Okay,” he said, moving back into Ronan’s arms and a deeper kiss. “Okay.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to Paula the Prokaryote for beta reading an early version of this and offering suggestions.


End file.
